Textile fabric for french-cord shoe bindings and other uses



March 5, 1929. F. E. AHEARN TEXTILE 'FABRIC FOR FRENCH CORD SHOE BINDINGS AND OTHER USES Filed June 29, 1927 fizzle? atented Mar. 5, 1929.

STATES FREDERIC E. .AHEARN. OF WOLLASTON,-MASSA(HUSETTS.

TEXTILE FABRIC FOR FRENCH-COBD SHOE BINDINGS AND OTHER USES.

Application filed June 29,

This invention relates to a woven textile fabric having selvages and other characteristic features adapting it to serve as a binding or finish, otherwise raw edges of a slipper or shoe; often called a French cord for the opening exposed for the entrance of the foot, for example.

The curved edges of this opening and other of that interior portion of the fabric, these.

characteristics still being consonant with manufacture by eflicient and therefore relativel inexpensive modes of weaving. The qualities referred to are in aid of reaching flexibility both transversely and laterally to the plane of the woven fabric so that the binding may be smoothly applied without wrinkles to follow relatively sharp curves.

A further object of the invention is to provide a selvage structure for that part of the fabric intended to be exposed at the turn over the edges of the counter or vamp constituting the so-called French cord which shall be consonant with an effective surface texture or pattern of weave for this exposed portion of the fabric, and which will at the same time provide when turned in as usual over a sewed seam, a sufiicient stuffing for the cord proper,

as well as an exceedingly effective hold for the attachment stitches, which are usually in a machine-sewed seam uniting the facing leather or cloth and an interlining to the inturned outer margin of the ribbon or tape of whichthe French cord structure is formed.

Another object is to provide in an integral strip fabric one longitudinally extending part or zone intended to go inside the shoe of such structure as not only to be longitudinally extensible and compressible,-but to provide a selvage of little prominence, not thicker or very little thicker than the fabric flanking 1t, and well adapted either to be entered between the vamp or counter lining and the lnterhning and the outer face fabric or leather, and thus being adapted, if desired, to be cemented or otherwise fastened either between the interlining and the lining or within and over 1927. Serial No. 202,233.

the edge of the lining. A further object is to provlde a narrow-ware integrally woven fabric having a grosgrain or Bengaline weave pattern side by side with the thin extensible and compressible fabric of the abovementioned characteristics, and also having a thickened selvage of high tensile strength, which is adapted in useas an exterior edge reinforce of the shoe opening and cord stufling.

I shall now describe the article of manufacture of the invention in connection with typical species only as shown in illustration of the genus of strip bindings in the accompanying drawings, in which:

Fig. 1 is a side elevation of a womans shoe illustrating one use of the invention;

Fig. 2 is a slightly exaggerated face view of one face of the fabric;

Fig. 3 is a diagram plan view of a section of the fabric;

Fig. 4 is an exaggerated detail in elevation showing the construction of the fabric;

Fig. 5 is a diagram typical cross section;

Fig. 6 is a section on the line 6 of Fig. 4;

Fig. 7 is a section on the line 7 of Fig. 4;

Fig. 8 is a cross section through the edge of shoe parts showing a stage of the manufacture of the shoe;

Fig. 9 is a view similar to Fig. the completed shoe; and

Fig. 10 is a view similar to Fig. 8 showing a modification.

Referring to Figs. 2, 3 and 4, the tape or ribbon 1 characteristically comprises a face section or zone 2 which may have any desir- 8 showing .able pattern, shown as of the familiar grosgrain or Bengaline weave, having a thick, strong selvage structure 3, and being laterally flanked throughout the length and through any desirable proportion of the width of the fabric by a section or zone 4 thinner than the sections 2 or 3, and, desirably. relatively more compressible and extensible than section 2. Section 4 is provided with a selvage 5, the selvage 5 having little or no excess of thickness as compared with I the thickness of the longitudinal section 4.

In order to produce any such fabric with good economy by usual operations on known instruments of manufacture, it is desirable that the weft extending transversely in reversed runs from selvage to selvage shall not be required to be different at one lateral part of the fabric from What it is at another lateral part of the fabric, so that the fabric may be built up by regular picks of weft 9 laid alternately in opposite directions, for example, as lengths of the same weft yarn 9 carried by the same shuttle of any usual narrowware loom. For the more decorative part of the fabric, for example, the section 2 which is exposed in use, a preferred construction comprising a warp for the section 2 (and desirably for the section 3) of lustrous relatively untwisted warp yarns; these typically are silk yarns 1O of low twist, or yarns of one of the artificial silks, or of any other strong highly lustrous textile fiber, for example, textiles such as ramie, polished or coated flax, spun glass, or the like. Vith all of the warps in the section 2, the weft may be engaged by passing through each open shed twice in alternate directions before each beat-up thus to make the well-known gros-' this section of fabric may be a 60 twill as illustrated, each warp passing over two wefts and under one in respect to one face of the fabric adjacent warps bearing the same relationwith respect to one of the wefts of the first-mentioned pair and another weft. Many other varieties of twill and sateen weaves provide a cloth of approximately the same characteristics and any of these weaves may beresorted to within the invention, if the structure is such as to result in a mere extensible and compressible fabric. In further aid of compressibility and extensibility of the section 4, preferably the warps in that section are the warps 12, which, as indicated, may be twisted warp-yarns of good quality and are of less width as they lie in the fabric than the widths of the warps 10. These qualities are such as follow from providing warps for the section 4 of cotton, mercerized cotton, artificial silk, or, if desired, of linen or other well-spinning textile capable of making a uniform and flexible but stron yarn. The preferred material is a very flexible lustrously-mercerized cotton of the same color as the warps 10.

It will be understood that because of the weave structure the warps 10 spread where they round the virtual cord comprised of the doubled wefts 9, giving the cylindric form of the appearance of the transverse ribs characteristic of the grosgrain weave.

The thickened selvage section 3 may be woven in any desirable way, but it is sufiicient to provide selvage warps 13 of relatively heavier yarns than the warlplf 12. The warps 13 may be silk, artificial si or cotton. The

1,704.,oee

shedding for four or more warp yarns at the section 3 is for a one-and-one weave as illustrated in Fig. 4. Preferably the spacin of the warps 13 is close, and the result of t ese provisions is to make the section 3 relatively thick as compared with the section 2 or the section 4. On the contrary, the selvage 5 at the left-hand side of Fig. 4 of the preferably twilled section 4 is not much, if any, thicker than the body of section 4, and only two warps 12 uniform with the warps of section 4 may be shed one-and-one to form this selvage.

In use, referring to Figs. 1, 8 and 9, the tape, strip or ribbon 1 may be applied with its selvage edge 3 in registry with the cut edges of the facing leather or cloth 15 and inter lining 14 of the Vamps or quarters of the shoe S; because of its qualities above mentioned this strip may be freely flexed in the direction of its own width to follow the sharp curves of this edge; and in this position may be sewed in place by a machine-sewed seam of stitches 16, Figs. 8 and 9. The tape or ribbon l is now turned, as indicated in one stage in Fig. 8 and completed in Fig. 9, so that its portion 4 lines flush against the upper edge of the inter-lining 14, in which position the ribbon 1 may be held'by cement either between it and the interlining 14 or between it and the lining 17 of the parts of the shoe in question, the usual cement not being shown. The seam 16 may be any distance within and parallel to selvage 3; for example, as shown in Fig. 10, the selvage 3 may overlie the cut edges of parts 14 and 15. Whatever the mode of fastening the interior lap 4 may be, the turn about the ultimate edge in the opening of'the shoe is constituted of the portion 2 of the ribbon or tape 1 and is highly lustrous or otherwise decorative. Moreover, the thickened selvage 3, being relatively inexpansible, adds something as a stay to reduce expansibility of the shoe parts 14, 15, 17 and performs an oflice of decoration in holding the turn about the edge of the parts 14, 15 to a rounder and more prominent figure.

Heretofore, so far as I am aware, theportions of ribbons or tapes employed for this purpose corresponding to the portion 4 of the present device have elther been thicker than the remainder of the ribbon or tape, or as little expansibleor compressible as the remainder of the tape 1. This does not 'comport well with smoothly and accurately cementing down the inner face of the French cord constituted of the tape or ribbon.. By the present device, wrinkles and lumps are avoided by the readiness with which the relatively thin specially woven fabric section 4 conforms to the often complex shape of the edge over which the ribbon or tape is folded in order to produce the French cord finish.

hen the warp threads of the section 2 are made of artificial silk, one or more of the warp threads of the selvage section 3 will preferably be of cotton for the reason that cotton threads are stronger than the usual artificial silk threads of the same size. A recommended structure is to make the two warp threads at the outside of the selvage section of cotton. This afiords greater strength for stitching in the selvage section 3 than if all the warps in the selvage section were of artificial silk.

I claim:

1. Textile fabric for French cord shoe bindings and other uses having therein longitudinal extending integrally connected sections of fabric side by side, one of said sections having a twilled weave-structure more extensible and compressible than the other, the other section having two or more runs of the weft common to both sections in each shed of the warps.

2. Woven fabric for an edge-binding having at least three longitudinally extending sections of different Woven texture, increasing in thickness successively from one longitudinal selvage edge to the other, the thickest fabric being at a selvage.

3. Woven fabric for an edge-binding having at least three longitudinally extending sections of difierent woven texture, increasing in thickness successively from one longitudinal selvage edge to the other, the thickest fabric being at a selvage adjacent to a section characterized by multiple wefts in each open shed ofwarp, and adapted to serve as an anchorage for a seam and a stuffing for an overturned longitudinal corded fold. 1

4. Woven fabric for an edge-bindinghaving at least three longitudinally extending sections of different woven texture, increasing in thickness successively from one longitudinal selvage edge to the other, the thickest fabric being at a selvage adjacent to a section characterized by multiple wefts in each open shed of warp, and adapted to serve as an anchorage for a seam and a stufling for an overturned longitudinal corded fold, the thinnest section of fabric having a weave structure more adaptable for longitudinal exten sion or compression than said thickest section.

5. Selvaged narrow ware for shoe bindings having a longitudinally extending section of twilled fabric with reversal of weft at a Single Warp for one selvage, and having an adjacent zone of fabric in which a plurality of wefts are engaged in each shed of the warp, said adjacent zone having a selvage including several relativel thick warps.

Signe by me at Boston, Massachusetts, this 27th day of June, 1927.

FREDERIC E. AHEARN. 

